Sometimes There’s Nothing You Can Do

Sometimes There’s Nothing You Can Do

500.00

Elizabeth Kauffman

2016

watercolor on gemini

22.5 x 30 in.

10 Things Series

As a new parent advice files at you from every direction. When the baby spikes a fever, cries in an unusual way, or produces odd odors or colors we turn to the internet—the message boards and blogs—for explanations and the stories of others who have been here before. Sage wisdom, born from someone's particular experience, is often boiled down into numbered lists of dos and don'ts accompanied by an adorable image of the perfect child. Pinterest is filled with such appealing posts: "5 Things You Should Never Tell Your Child"; "30 Things To Help Your Baby Sleep"; "10 Things All Good Moms Do". These simple solutions and picturesque images are as tempting as they are dangerous. They suggest that the complicated relationship between parent and child can be easily navigated if you just do (or don't do) these particular things. This body of work encapsulates my own anxieties in my role as a new mother, and continues my exploration of the connection between text and image. Using my own daughter as model, her image is modified in each work by vague text, suggestive of the contradictions often found between the reality of childrearing and the way our culture describes it.